The Battle Against Ordinary
by StoryDiva
Summary: Pyro point of view set before X2 as he battles with the idea of being ordinary and what life has in store for him and his classmates.


**Title: ** The Battle Against Ordinary 

**Author: ** Storydivagirl - tommygirl at gmail dot com 

**A/N: ** This was written as a back-up story for the X-Men movieverse ficathon. It hasn't been properly beta-d, but I didn't want to put off this back-up fic for any longer considering November will be crazy. There is some John and Rogue as friends because I love the two of them together in any shape or form. Feedback always appreciated. 

-- 

John Allerdyce has never been familiar with the words ordinary or normal. Well, he understands their meaning (he's not completely lacking in intelligence), but has never witnessed it firsthand, has never been defined by those sort of words. Unless it's being used to exemplify his own lacking, how he is the _opposite_ of those things. Unless some random case worker in plaid pants, a shirt stained with sweat rings under the arms, and golf shoes is exclaiming in exasperation, "Why can't you be normal, John? Maybe then I could find you a home for more than five days." 

Why is it that people who wear ugly clothes have life so damn easy? No one ever hears about some guy sporting a purple polo outfit riding the bus and getting mugged. No one ever kicks out the son who carries around a pocket protector. Apparently, ordinary people experience nothing but perfection in life and they don't know how to appreciate it. 

What is so great about ordinary anyway? What sort of legacy does an ordinary man leave on the world around him? Ordinary people seemed so bored that they have to drum up fear of anyone who dares to be different (some people, like him, not choosing it). Ordinary people live mundane lives while greatness thrives within the unique. 

Maybe that's why people hate him. 

Not that John believes that he's destined for greatness. He wants to be-who doesn't-but it seems like something meant for the Bobby's of the world, the patient, posterboy types with smiles of gold. John is much more the warrior type, the behind-the-scenes-kick-ass-for-his-cause type. John is the guy who stands on the periphery of greatness and doesn't really care as long as he gets to live without waiting for the floor to drop out from underneath him. 

Though there are moments where he does wonder about something more, something beyond the safety of his school, the classes and the X-Men who try to keep the peace while keeping the mutants hidden until _the time is right_. 

Sometimes John isn't sure what he's doing at the Xavier School. It doesn't really suit his personality. Bobby says that's not true, that John belongs there just as much as the others, but John knows better. He knows that he's stayed there more out of necessity than anything else - where else could a guy like him go without end up being some side-show freak? Before Xavier found him, he was spending his nights in New York City, riding the subway and using his lighter to keep himself warm. Before Xavier found him, he was a loser with no future rather than whatever he was now, capable but useless to the cause. Living like that, he learned not to turn his nose up to a warm bed and plenty of food - no matter what the costs, no matter how often he found himself unable to buy into Xavier's hopeful outlook on things for mutants. 

It's not only Xavier, but _everyone_ at the school - so full of faith in others. The only thing faith ever got John was the threat of death if he didn't get out of his house immediately. Faith in humanity is like trying to bluff your way out of a pair of twos in high stakes poker. 

John finds himself watching his classmates and friends living in this weird bubble where everything always works out and they're not deemed as "freaks" by the outside world, but "special." John knows better than to buy into that sort of philosophy. He can see it in the professors' eyes - that nervous tick, that "please God don't let this law pass" small smile - as they try to force the history of the Roman Empire down his throat. 

Dr. Grey doesn't like it when John points out that what made the Romans great was their "don't fuck with me" attitude. She folds her arms and stares at him as he goes on about how the Romans knew they were more powerful than the others who surrounded them and they made that fact known. The Romans didn't hide their abilities to ease the minds of the others around them - they instilled fear and the promise of retribution if one of theirs was touched. 

"That sort of thinking didn't pay off for them in the long run, John," she counters. 

John shrugs and replies, "That's because they got greedy." He ignores the looks from his classmates. He refuses to respond to Bobby's "what the hell" question after class. It's not something he can force on the others. There will come a time when they'll all have to make their own decisions - where they'll stand, whether they'll fight or linger in the wings wishing for peace and having faith in people. 

He reminds himself of that when Rogue appears next to him at dinner that night and it surprises him when he blurts out his take on their future. In trying to ignore the fact that he's talking to her about things like this, he gets fervent in his arguments. Because sometimes John thinks that the Romans had the right idea and something similar needs to happen within the confines of the school to prepare them for the future. Sometimes John believes it's time to show the world what the mutant population can do, survival of the fittest and all that junk. He doubts some Senator from the Bible belt would come to the door with cages claiming anger on God's behalf if he's going to be met with the wrath of the mutant world. 

"Stop talking like that, John. You sound like _him_," Rogue says. She often says things of this nature whenever he balances the walls of the things _we just don't talk about_. She points to her stripe of white hair and adds, "This is what happens when men decide to play God." 

John lets it go for awhile. He doesn't want to hurt Rogue and he's usually the first to admit that he doesn't really know anything. He's a kid whose family never wanted him, whose best friend freezes thing, and whose favorite pastime is playing with a lighter he purloined from one of his foster families because it was the closest thing to a home and continuity he ever had. 

He forces a smile and replies, "Sorry. I just worry." 

She smiles. She has this amazing smile, the sort that has lived many more years and seen things that normal girls her age can't fathom, and her gloved hand brushes against his. "We all worry, John." 

He arches his eyebrows. He points to where two of the girls from school are pausing a Tom Cruise movie to watch him prance about bare-chested and asks, "Are you sure about that?" 

She laughs and says, "Some of us hide it better than others." 

John thinks about that every day for a week. He talks video games with Bobby, listens to him yap about how he thinks Rogue is his soulmate, and plays basketball with his classmates to pass the time. All the while, his mind reels around the idea that each of the students is quite aware of everything going on in the world around them. At the school, they are secluded, but even all the security measures in the world can't keep out the bogeymen. Affecting all of them - even Bobby of the perfect family with the perfect life and perfect boy-next-door smile - because deep down they're all aware of what could happen, what could be lingering over the next horizon...ordinary people who can't grasp anything that doesn't fit their norm...ordinary people with guns and cages and fear used as weapons against the mutant population, against those that can't help but be different. 

He thinks about it, watches it swirl around him, until he feels like his head is going to burst. He sneaks into Rogue's room one night, sits on the corner of her bed, and says, "We're in trouble, aren't we?" 

"Not if Professor Xavier has his way." 

"He's one man, Rogue. Maybe our best bet is to get out now - run and hide." 

Rogue rolls her eyes and asks, "How's that worked out for you in the past, John? Speaking from experience, I prefer this place." 

"Yeah. Me too," John pauses, rolling his shoulders and smirking before tugging on her hair, "Though I'd deny that if anyone asked." 

She smiles knowingly and replies, "Of course." 

"Normal people don't know how easy they have it." 

She shrugs and gets this faraway look, the sort she usually suppresses before her guard comes completely down. He understands that feeling, that need to protect yourself from memories. She lets out a long, drawn out sigh and replies, "Sometimes I wonder if the so-called normal people think the same thing about us." 

John scoffs at the thought. That is crazy talk - pure and simple. He shakes his head and says, "We haven't got anything, Rogue, and the little we do have, they want to take away from us." 

"It doesn't have to be that way." 

John rolls his eyes and replies, "Ya know, I expect this sort of thing from Bobby, but you've seen what people are really like, Rogue. You know how ignorant and scared they can be." 

"True, but being equally ignorant and scared won't accomplish anything, John. Maybe Bobby and the others are holding out faith that everyone else will see we're just as ordinary as everyone else." 

John stands up. It hits him that maybe he's alone in these thoughts, that maybe not even Rogue really understands what being ordinary entails. His parents were ordinary when they told him to get out and that he was an abomination. His sister was ordinary when she turned her head, pretending not to know who he was, when he saw her later that same week. All those foster families and social workers were ordinary as they shuttled him around, making sure he knew that he didn't belong. 

John balls his hands up into fists and hits himself in the legs repeatedly. He wants to shout at her, shake her, and make her understand the feeling in his gut that things are about to change, that something big is coming... 

He can't because that's not the way John is. He's not destined for greatness or leaving behind a great legacy. The only thing he knows for damn sure: he's not fucking ordinary. 

_Fin_


End file.
